The St. Louis Blues opened up a notheast road trip with a game against the New York Islanders. Both teams are hovering around the .500 mark, so it's never easy to figure out what might happen.
The last time the two played, it was a 1-0 game with the lone goal coming for the Blues in overtime. It started off about the same in the first period of this game too.
It was a tightly contested game for much of the opening frame. Both goaltenders, Ilyia Sorokin and Jordan Binnington were forced to make several quality saves.
The odd thing about the period was there weren't a ton of chances overall, but the quality of the looks were too high. The Blues had four dangerous chances on goal on just seven shots.
Unfortunately, the Blues couldn't get into intermission tied. P.O. Joseph tried to force a pass up the right wall that was picked off leading to a three-on-two the other way. Kyle Palmieri came right down the middle and whizzed a wrister past Binnington for a 1-0 lead.
The second period was almost a mirror image of the first. Both goalies were on their games, with Binnington tested far more often than Sorokin.
Just like the first, the Blues gave up a goal in the last five minutes. This time it was a power play goal against. Colton Parayko challenged the puck carrier below the goal line too quickly before forward help came in. The Isles fed it to Brock Nelson in the deep slot and he chipped one in to make it 2-0.
Turnabout was fair play as the Blues got an early power play goal in the third. They drew a penalty shortly after the period began and then scored 45 seconds into the period and just nine seconds into the power play.
Pavel Buchnevich took the feed on the goal line and just like the Isles goal, drew the defender out early. He then fed it to Jake Neighbours on the back post and he finished it off with a quick chip to make it 2-1.
The Blues were buzzing, creating several chances and doubling the Isles shots midway through the period. However, it appeared as though New York doubled the lead when they scored from the right wing with just over eight left. It was correctly challenged for goalie interference as Palmieri landed on Binnington's back with nobody touching him, so it was called no goal.
The Blues could not capitalize even though they were given chances to. They survived the interference goal and then were gifted an icing play with just over 90 seconds left too. St. Louis pulled the goalie and had tired Islanders out on the ice.
They barely even got any looks towards goal and eventually gave up the empty netter. The Blues were too lax coming out of the zone and nobody told Brayden Schenn someone was coming, so all it took was a bump to knock him off the puck at the blue line and Palmieri was able to slot it home for a 3-1 win.
Con: Lack of killer instinct finishing
When you're facing a team that held you scoreless in regulation in the last game, you know it's not likely to be a goal fest. However, there has to be someone to grab the bull by the horns.
Sorokin was good, but it never felt like he was absolutely standing on his head. If anything, he was the second best goalie on the ice and he still got the win.
The Blues didn't challenge enough. 25 shots is respectable, but it took 10 third period shots just to get that many.
Where is the finishing? Where are the snipers? The Blues bring up talent through the pipeline or even bring it in from outside in the form of Buchnevich, but there's nobody that just grabs the game by the scruff and says I'm winning it for us.
Hockey is a hard game to score in, but there's just not a killer instinct to finish off plays and finish off opponents when they gift you chances.
Pro: Jordan Binnington
The final may have been 3-1, but it could have been much worse before the Blues even scored. St. Louis' netminder made save after save to keep his team in the game.
We shouldn't pretend as though the Islanders were threatening to go on a scoring barrage, but they had a lot of quality chances. Of their 31 shots, at least a third were from either in tight or in high-danger spots and Binnington kept them all out except for two.
The Blues need to step up for their goalie for once. The sad thing is the defense is improved and they're still allowing way too much. A team like the Islanders shouldn't get 30-plus shots.
Con: Faceoffs
It was always going to be a steep hill to climb going against some of the best faceoff takers in the league, but the Blues were just terrible. It was understandable when Robert Thomas was out, but they only won 35.8% of their draws in this game.
Thomas won a little over 33%. Oskar Sundqvist was at just over 37%. Schenn was under 42% and Faksa led the way with 50%.
Those are abysmal numbers. When you can't win faceoffs, you're forcing your entire team to work for much longer in the game to win the puck back.
Nobody should think winning faceoffs is easy. It's taken years for Thomas to become one of the better ones at it. But to get outdueled that badly just sets you up for failure.
Overview
Look, I love the Blues. If you're reading this article, you love the Blues. We all have differing viewpoints about how their retool is going and that's fine.
The sad truth is that they're just not very good for very long. I'm one of those that thinks they've made good moves and have some pieces almost ready in the minors or in juniors to where they need to just keep adding supplemental players as extra pieces to fill the gaps.
There's nothing to be done to fix this year. I'm not saying it's over because there's enough mediocrity going on for the Blues to sneak into the playoffs, but they're their own worst enemy.
The Islanders aren't a great team, but they did what they needed to do to win. The Blues didn't.
There's not enough offense. There's not enough quality decisions going on by the defenders.
I don't care if you have Binnington or if you want to trade him and go with Hofer. No goaltender in history is going to completely carry a team if they make the mistakes the Blues make.
Even Chris Kerber pondered how the mistake that Joseph made on the stretch pass that led to the first goal has haunted the Blues so often this season. Injuries or not, those mistakes, or similar ones, continually end up in the back of the net.
Nobody is stepping up. Nobody is leading. I'm not trying to be as doom and gloom as so many others, but the reality is that this team has a confidence crisis.
They try hard, but they can't get out of their own way. They can't hold leads if they do score first and they can't keep playing an entire season of trying to catch up.
The Islanders have a much more veteran team, so it's not apples to apples, but it was always a 50/50 proposition for this contest. You have two teams struggling to find consistency and something would break.
Unfortunately, the Blues broke. St. Louis isn't a bad team, but they are mediocre. They're not devoid of talent, but it's not being steered correctly by the leadership in the locker room or the performances on the ice.
Your best players were all minuses in this game. You can't keep saying the third or fourth lines were your best and expect to have many wins.